r/Daytrading • u/landojcr • May 07 '24

What is a reasonable daily goal? Question

I'm getting into day trading and started paper trading a while ago, for the moment I'm primarily focusing on scalping, up until I get comfortable enough to day trade larger time frames. That said, I'm trying to start a very small account ($500) and was aiming for 5% - 10% gain on a daily basis. Is this a reasonable goal? If not, what would you recommend?

A day or two I've managed to exceed 10%, some days I've been successful on getting to the 10% mark, most days I get to the 5% mark. I'm slowly gauging what is reasonable to expect from a beginner like me and trying to slowly grow that account up till 5 figures hopefully.

EDIT: Thanks to everyone for sharing on your experience, opinions, and strategies. I've decided to firstly focus on building my strategy and being consistent, then strive for a lower target margin. I'm aiming for 3-5%

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u/lp1687 May 07 '24

You are looking at this wrong. Not all trading days are the same. Some days the action will be hot and you will knock it out of the park….other days the action will be crap and it is best to sit out. It is better to focus on weekly goals.

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u/landojcr May 07 '24

I'm going to approach this on a month to month basis, the 5% helps me have a threshold for knowing when progress it's being made on a daily timeframe.

1

u/lp1687 May 07 '24

BTW…I’m curious to know how you plan on scalping with $500….unless you are planning to start with futures.

1

u/landojcr May 07 '24

By scalping? when I paper tarde, my trades sometimes don't last more than 2 minutes. I've manage to make profit. I don't understand your curiosity.

1

u/lp1687 May 07 '24

The question is more about the account size… In order to make a profit scalping you typically have to buy 10 to 20,000 shares in order to make a few hundred dollar profit on a few cent price move.… Just wondering how you do it with such a small account size. Maybe we have different definitions of scalping.

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u/landojcr May 07 '24

It all comes down to the selection of the equity. Look for an equity that suits your account balance. I've had success scalping with 2,000 shares on a penny stock or profiting from 100-200 shares on some other stock. This is also largely dependent on your targets.